Europe Inflation Hits 20-Month High, Jobless at 10%

European inflation accelerated to the fastest pace in more than 1 1/2 years on rising energy costs and unemployment held at the highest in almost 12 years.

Euro-area consumer prices rose 1.7 percent from a year earlier in July after increasing 1.4 percent in June, the European Union statistics office in Luxembourg said today. That’s the fastest inflation since November 2008 and in line with the median forecast of 33 economists in a Bloomberg News survey. The jobless rate remained at 10 percent for a fourth month in June, the statistics office said in a separate report. That’s the highest since August 1998.